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 Topic: Columbus Destroyers: Who are these guys?
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| Columbus Destroyers: Who are these guys? |
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| Rob Hammersmith |
| Posted: 2006 March 19 at 3:56pm | IP Logged
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Joined: 2004 April 13
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Going into this game it was a must win by all counts. The team has games at two 6-1 teams in the coming weeks (Colorado - 3/26 and Dallas - 4/1). Without a win at home against Philadelphia (4-4) last night the Columbus Destroyers (4-4) would have probably been looking at a 3-7 record heading into April. That could have had serious consequences for this new AFL team after two seasons of substandard play (2004: 6-10, and 2005: 2-14) and given that the last home game against Georgia had produced the lowest attendance in Destroyers history (10801) despite the Destroyers coming from behind to win on the road in New York (4-4) to bring home the teams first .500 record this late in the season in the previous week.
Not only did the team show up last night, but so did the fans. Despite NCAA March Madness with the Ohio State Buckeyes as a #2 seed in Dayton, 12,807 screaming fans set a season high in attendance. The team rewarded these faithful fans with the biggest blow out in team history (Destroyers 53, Philadelphia 20).
So who are these guys that earlier in the year can get thumped by Kansas City (1-7) to fall to 1-3? Well, let's just say it's not anywhere near the same team that went 2-14 last year. Virtually everyone from last years roster was replaced. None of these guys had any experience playing with each other and the first four games were proof of that.
To show how drastic the change in chemistry has been over the first two months let's look at QB John Kaleo's stats:
1st 4 games:
63/130 (48%), 681 yards, 12 TDs, 6 INTs
Destroyers record 1-3
Last 4 games:
95/137 (69%), 1156 yards, 18 TDs, 3 INTs
Destroyers record 3-1
And not only is the offense beginning to click with Kaleo, but the defense ranks second in the league in fewest opponents points per game. Just ask AFL veteran QB's Sherdrick Bonner and Tony Graziani who were recently schooled by the Destroyers defense how tough this perennial also-ran team has become this year.
So where is this team going to go from here? Well, it's had to argue against the claim that the Destroyers have the toughest remaining schedule of any AFL team. But given how well the team is playing right now, if I'm an AFL team Columbus is the last team I want on my remaining schedule now. The second half of the season should be a lot of fun.
On a side note, despite the Georgia game being a season low in attendance, the 10,801 fans exceeded attendance of a third of the other AFL games that week, and Columbus overall average attendance still ranks in the upper half of all 18 AFL teams. That's not bad for a team that went 8-24 the prior two seasons. Consider Grand Rapids (AFL since 1998), a team that has performed as bad as Columbus the past few years, is drawing less than 6K a game, and had 4,848 at their home game this weekend. While it's still not established that Columbus can support an AFL team even if the team doesn't win, Columbus certainly isn't a market of concern for the AFL at this point.
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Rob Hammersmith
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